“He’s treated our soldiers straight from the battlefield and served at ground zero,” the spot adds, showing a photo of Heck, a colonel in the Army Reserve, in uniform during a tour of Iraq.

“He’s grown a small business, met a payroll and balanced a budget,” a reference to when he ran his private practice.

And, of course, the ad focuses on his family life as well, showing him with his wife and three children, a son and two daughters, in the kitchen at home and eating pizza.

“We can trust Dr. Joe Heck because in difficult times nothing is more important to him than caring for our families,” the ad says in the closer.

The ad will run for three weeks at a cost of about $45,000, according to the Heck campaign. Heck is running for a third two-year term to represent the 3rd Congressional District in Clark County, including Henderson and Boulder City.

Although the ad is a positive commercial, Heck’s Democratic opponent, Erin Bilbray, sent an email to her supporters warning that he was coming out with an ad attacking her and asking for campaign donations so she could fight back.

“Joe Heck just dropped $44,000 bucks on an attack ad against Erin that will air all across Southern Nevada next week!” the email declared.

“The game is on, and we cannot give up the fight. Trust us — Joe Heck will stop at nothing to stay in Congress to protect his special interest. We cannot allow Joe Heck to slander Erin — a real leader — all across Southern Nevada.”

— Laura Myers

HECK, BILBRAY DEBATE 2

The game is on as far as debates go in the race between Heck and Bilbray.

The Heck campaign said it had agreed to a second debate on PBS, although no date or details have been confirmed.

Bilbray said she wasn’t aware of the proposed PBS faceoff, but she’s willing to debate Heck anywhere, any time.

Earlier in the campaign, Bilbray suggested the two contenders debate at least four times before the Nov. 4 general election.

“I am so confident about articulating my beliefs and how I truly want to represent this district in Southern Nevada,” Bilbray said in an interview, adding that once she hears from PBS she surely will accept the debate challenge.

Heck and Bilbray also are scheduled to debate Oct. 24 on “Ralston Reports” hosted by Jon Ralston.

Some voters might have cast their ballots by the time that debate airs, as there will have been almost a week of early voting by then. Early voting starts Oct. 18 and continues through Oct. 31.

Bilbray, who in Friday replaced her second campaign manager, has a lot of work to do to unseat Heck.

The respected Rothenberg report puts Heck in the winning column.

“Bilbray is proving to be one of the most disappointing candidates of the cycle on the Democratic side,” Rothenberg said in its latest assessment.

In Southern Nevada, the TV show can be seen at 4:30 p.m. Mondays on Cox Cable Channel 123.

The two candidates already have agreed to debate Sept. 3 before the Hispanics in Politics organization. The faceoff is scheduled to start at 8 a.m. during the group’s regular breakfast meetings. Luckily, coffee will be served — not to mention a breakfast with eggs, beans, rice and other specialties of Dona Maria’s Mexican Restaurant, the organization’s regular meeting site.

The Nevada Democratic Party has dusted off its chicken suit and has been chasing and mocking Hutchison, saying he is afraid to debate Flores. The fowl follies are mostly because Hutchison has refused a proposed debate on “Ralston Reports,” a forum at which he lost his cool ahead of the June 10 GOP primary when he debated Sue Lowden.

Ironically, the Democrats started using a person dressed in a chicken suit to stalk Lowden during her failed GOP campaign in the 2010 U.S. Senate race with Republicans competing to face U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev.

Lowden had said people could barter for health care much like rural folks have done over the years, including offering chickens in lieu of payment to doctors. Democrats mocked her mercilessly, but she never backed down from her statement, which might have contributed to her defeat to Sharron Angle, who won the primary but lost the general election.

— Laura Myers

CAR WASH BAN — NOT

The thought of banning people from washing their cars on the street is positively abhorrent, definitely un-American and a slap in the the face to the Carl’s Jr. burger ads with Paris Hilton.

Fortunately, the two new bills to be introduced at Wednesday’s Las Vegas City Council meeting wouldn’t, although at first glance one seemed to do that. The agenda said the bill would prohibit the washing of vehicles upon public streets and rights of way.

No way.

But if you read the bill, it has exceptions.

Paris Hilton could wash her car on the street or call a mobile car wash and be legal.

The two bills proposed by Jorge Cervantes, executive director of Development Center, are designed to block those mobile car wash and auto detail operations that set up in one spot to do business.

One ordinance would require mobile car wash services to get a business license in the city, the other would prohibit the mobile operations from using a public right of way to set up their business and remain stationary.

City spokesman Jace Radke said that the city’s Separate Storm System permit issued by the Nevada Division of Environmental Protection allows the city to discharge stormwater and treated wastewater into the Las Vegas Wash. But the permit also requires that the city monitor and regulate anything that enters its storm drain system.

“Runoff from mobile car wash operations in public right of way enter our storm system through the drop inlets that are in the curb. Under our permit, we are required to pass ordinances prohibiting this type of activities from occurring,” he explained.

Regular car washes that don’t wander the town have special recycling programs that don’t harm the Las Vegas Wash.

If the city doesn’t do this, it can be fined or have its permit revoked. “In which case we would no longer be able to discharge into the wash.”

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